


The Most Beautiful Thing

by TheSkyrimLife



Category: Mary Poppins - All Media Types, Mary Poppins Returns (2018)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-23
Updated: 2018-12-23
Packaged: 2019-09-25 01:58:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,687
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17112290
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheSkyrimLife/pseuds/TheSkyrimLife
Summary: John starts to have feelings for a new classmate, and goes to Jack for assistance.





	The Most Beautiful Thing

John picked up his books and slid them into his backpack. He had to get to school, of course. It was the first day since Mary Poppins had left, and also the first after spring break. She had told him to stay in school, or else he’d end up like the dirty man on the corner.

He decided to heed her advice.

Ellen ran in, holding his lunch pail. “Don’t forget this, Johnny! You’d not like to starve, would you?”

He cleared his throat and took his meal. “Certainly not, Miss.”

She waved him off. “Oh, please, how many times must I say that I’m no ‘Miss’. I’m Ellen!”

John smiled. “Certainly not, Ellen.”

Ellen laughed. “Run along, you little rascal.”

Annabel clip-clopped down the stairs in her boots. “Let’s go, John! We musn’t be late!”

The both of them practically fell out of the door trying to get out of the house.

John’s teacher, Mrs. Errens, looked like she was a witch. That’s all that he could think about. Witch, witch, witch. No mathematics, no spelling, no reading, just an old hag. The second he had walked into the classroom when school began that year, he nearly reeled in fright at the baggy skin on her face. However, he caught himself, remembering what his father said about being a gentleman.

When they were halfway through a lesson, she stopped short all of the sudden. John turned to his friend Charlie and whispered, “She may be dead,”. They giggled. She always did this, forgetting to take attendance over seventy-percent of the time.

Her wrinkly old hand came up to her mouth. “Oh, dearie me, I forgot to take the attendance.” She picked up her clipboard. “Let’s get on with it, shall we?”

“Ackerrman?”

“Present,” Called Vinny, who was too busy reading a book to care.

“Arthurs?”

Patrick cried out “Here!” In response.

“Banks?”

John raised his hand.

“Davies?”

Charlie let out a sort of squawk for his answer, earning him a dirty look from Mrs. Errens.

“Eberly?”

Strangely, this time, there was nobody to claim the name. “Eberly?” She said again, but still no sound.

Suddenly, the most beautiful thing John had ever seen ran into the classroom. It was a boy with wavy brown hair that looked like it hadn’t been combed after his morning bath, and thus was peeking out under his cap. The hat was special, too. It looked like one of the ones Jack and the Leeries would wear.

The beautiful thing pushed a strand of hair out of his incredible gray eyes and said, “I’m Oscar Eberly. The new boy. I’m here.”

The witch pushed her glasses up her nose. “And why, Mr. Eberly, were you late to class?”

He looked down guiltily. “I was helping my father to dim the lamps, Miss. I’m very sorry.”

She sniffed. “Very well. Have a seat next to Mr. Banks.” Her lanky finger pointed directly towards John’s now red face.

Oscar shuffled across the room and sat down on the other side of John, who suddenly had the urge to fix his hair. Why would he want to fix his hair? He never cared about how it looked before, why would he care now? “Hey,” The new kid said. “Do you have any cough drops?” That was when he froze, his hands stopping their passage through his hair, noting that Oscar’s voice was raspy for the first time.

John cleared his throat. “Um, let me see...” He opened up his lunch pail, hoping that Ellen hadn’t chosen today to discontinue the tradition of putting one next to his sandwich. Luckily, she remembered, and he carefully unwrapped the wax paper and handed it to Oscar, who responded with a brisk nod.

He didn’t know how, and he didn’t know why, but the only thing John wanted was to be with this boy for the rest of his life.

The first thing John did after he got home was wolf down one of Ellen’s cookies and put one in the pocket of his trousers.

Before he could sneak out, Annabel tapped him on the shoulder, causing him to whirl around and nearly drop his half-eaten apple. (Come on, he had to have  _some_  fiber)

“Where are you going?”

John swallowed nervously. “Just to, uh, hang out with the Leeries.” He held his breath.

She only shrugged. “Good for you. I’ve got better things worth my time.” Annabel walked off, a sigh of relief leaving John’s mouth. Normally, he wouldn’t really mind, but this was a private conversation, and one that wasn’t any of her business.

As he stepped outside, Jack just happened to be riding by, a basket of apples on the back of his bicycle. “Jack,” He cried. “I need a ride!”

Jack’s head turned, a grin already on his stubbled face. “Well, come along then, lad! These apples won’t deliver themselves.”

John ran across the street and leapt onto the bike, which hadn’t even stopped for him. That was the thing about Jack, he always wanted you to learn something. He said it was because he never got to go to school and that knowledge was one of the most important things in life. “So, where’s you going, little leerie?”

He scratched the back of his neck. “Um, I was actually wondering if I could talk to you about something. Is that alright?”

“Why, of course, John!” His voice had some slight concern in it, which made him nervous. He didn’t want to scare Jack, he was his only friend, at least, the only one besides Charlie, who had never even come over to his house for tea. “What seems to be the problem?”

“Well, there’s this new kid, and he makes my stomach feel all,” John though for a moment. How did it make him feel? Ah, there was the word! “Bubbly. I don’t know what it is, but I can’t say that it’s a new feeling. I felt it when I looked at Agnes Yates last year, every time I thought about her, every time until she moved to Kent.”

Jack's bicycle screeched to a stop in the middle of the street. He hid it in an alley and grabbed John by the hand. “Come on the rooftop with me, son, there’s a secret I must tell you.”

He’d never heard Jack talk this way before. He sounded...serious. It was kind of scary.

They stomped up the narrow fire escape of the butcher shop nearest to the bike and reached the roof. Jack motioned for John to sit down on the edge. John obliged and tossed his legs over, his favorite leerie doing the same.

For a while, there was only silence from Jack. He seemed to be thinking. “What’s his name?” He finally whispered.

“Oscar Eberly.”

Jack nodded. “I know ‘im. His dad is a leerie, works with us. He just took on a second job so that Oscar could go to school and relax. They can’t even afford medicine for him. He’s got the worst case of a sore throat I’ve ever heard.”

John chuckled softly. “Well, that explains the cough drops, then,”

“About that feeling that you had with Oscar, it’s the same one I had when I first saw your auntie.”

The boy cocked his head. “I’m not quite sure I understand,”

Jack turned to him, tears in his eyes. “You’re in love with this boy, John.”

John couldn’t remember a lot from that night, just a lot of crying, a lot of sadness. He kept bringing up what happened when the police came and took away the sodomite that lived in the flat a few blocks from their house. His father had shielded his eyes and muttered cross words about the mistreatment that bobbies would give everyone who wasn’t a “Perfect Brit.”.

Jack just held him and tried to calm him down. It took him over an hour, for John was so hysterical and in denial that all he could think was what would happen if the officers took  _him_  away.

Finally, John was taken home on the back of Jack’s bicycle and carried into the house. Father was cross at first, but Jack just told him what happened, minus the part of being a homosexual. He just said that John had been upset about a spiral downwards in his grades. Then, Father just nodded and told him to go upstairs and get a good night’s sleep.

The next day, he couldn’t concentrate at school. One, because of Oscar’s pretty eyes, and two, because he couldn’t think of anything but how he would never be able to find love. Nobody would like someone who liked both boys and girls. It simply wasn’t possible.

When it was about an hour before class let out, a slight knock echoed on the window next to him. It was Jack, who was holding a box of sugar sprinkled doughnuts. He gave a stubbled smile, a smile only Jack could give. John raised his hand. “May I use the lavatory?”

Mrs. Errens sighed. “Very well, but don’t be long, Mr. Banks.”

As he was leaving, John tapped Oscar’s shoulder and gestured to the door. He nodded and directly after the first boy left, he could hear Oscar asking to relieve himself.

The second he was out of sight, John ran as fast as he could down the halls and out the door into the waiting gaze of Jack. “Will our friend be joining us?”

Oscar rounded the corner. “Yes he will. May I have a pastry, please?”

“Why, of course, young man,” The child grinned and picked up a doughnut.

For the next two minutes, they both smacked on the doughnuts and laughed as Jack told a quick story about the time where he made Bert laugh so hard that milk flew out of his nose.

But, of course, Jack soon checked his watch and told them that they should head inside. They did so, Oscar in the lead, but before John could head off, he turned back to Jack with a smile and whispered, “He’s the most beautiful thing, isn’t he?”

**Author's Note:**

> I just saw this film and it is hands down, the best of the year.


End file.
